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“I know people say things,” she continues gently. “Words meant to make it better. But this...” she gestures toward the letter, “...this is truth. From his heart.”

I shake my head slowly.

“He wouldn’t want you to stop living.”

Something snaps inside me.

“He can’t want anything now,” I say, my voice sharp, breaking. “Because he’s dead.”

The second the words leave my mouth, I regret them.

Her eyes flicker with hurt.

I lost my husband. She lost a husband... and a grandson.

“I believe there is more to the afterlife than we understand,” she says quietly.

I don’t answer.

I stopped believing the moment I begged God to save him and watched him die anyway.

“Maria! Giovanni!”

My parents step back into the room.

“Tell her what we decided.”

My mother looks torn apart.

“I won’t stand by and help you destroy yourself anymore.”

My father’s arm wraps around her.

“I already lost a son,” he says, voice cracking. “I won’t lose a daughter too.”

My stomach drops.

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“We booked you a flight to Wyoming. Tomorrow morning.”

“What?” My head snaps toward my mother.

She nods. Nonna presses the keys into my hand.

“These are for Paradiso Ranch.”

My fingers curl around them automatically.

“We lived there until your Damiano was sixteen,” she explains softly. “Then we moved to Chicago when his father opened up his business there. That’s where we met you.”

I stare at the keys. “I know that, Damiano always talked about Wyoming, we were planning a trip there but then...” I shake my head, not going there.

“I don’t understand.”

“Nora,” my mother says, voice trembling, “we love you. We would walk through fire for you. But letting you stay here like this... watching you destroy yourself... it’s not helping you.”

My father looks seconds away from crying.